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Babble’s Closure Blamed On Disney+

Recently Disney announced they are closing down their parenting blog “Babble.com”, saying:

For everything there is a season, and after more than a decade of serving as a community and resource for parents, Babble will be saying goodbye.

To all the moms, dads, family, friends, writers, and readers who supported us – thank you.

We are so grateful for the time spent sharing your stories and your lives, through all the ups and downs of raising tiny humans.

And according to TechCrunch, Disney’s new streaming service, Disney+, is being blamed for the closure. A Disney spokesperson told them:

“As Disney Digital Network evolves to support the launch of Disney’s upcoming streaming service, Disney+, Babble.com ceased to update editorial content as of December 14, 2018. For fresh Disney-themed family crafts, recipes and activities, visit Disney Family at disney.com/family. For authentic parenting news, stories and videos, visit GoodMorningAmerica.com/Family.”

Disney purchased Babble back in 2011 for a reported $40 million, having originally launched in 2006. But the website hasn’t been able to remain its steady growth it once had, especially as readers turn to other sites and social media.

Disney can be pretty ruthless when it comes to closing down companies or projects, that aren’t performing. Especially within the digital area, such as closing down its internal video game business including titles like Disney Infinity and most recently, Club Penguin. They’ve also been making major changes to the YouTube centric “Maker Studios” by merging it into the Disney Digital Network, which saw Disney drop huge numbers of content creators and staff, before moving this unit within the Walt Disney Direct-to-Consumer and International division.

My Take: Disney+ is being cited as the main reason for the closure does seem odd, it’s a completely different business to a streaming service. Cutting down costs or just selling it on, would make more sense than just closing it completely since it still has a audience and regular visitors. It could simply be that Disney isn’t making enough money on the project to make it viable anymore, but it seems a shame it couldn’t live on elsewhere. But if the site has made back its initial investment since 2011, it might not be seen by Disney as a total rightoff. Hopefully the team will be put onto other projects, especially if their knowledge could create new video content for Disney+.